DoE Solar Energy Report On Market Penetration Outlook for Solar PV

As we contemplate the future of energy, and the combination of utility-level and distributed energy, and of different types – solar PV, solar thermal (heat your own hot water for showers), wind, etc., one question I have asked myself is how much energy can realistically be produced by the solar collectors on the roofs of our houses and office buildings in the U.S.?

It turns out the United States government has done some research on this! There’s a very interesting set of Department Of Energy reports, including one (PDF) on the market opportunities for grid-tied distributed solar PV. It figures out, state by state, how much roof surface is available, how attractive the incentives and infrastructure are (e.g., is there net metering?) and uses some simple algorithms to come up with an expected market penetration for solar PV on commercial and residential roofs. The resulting amount of electricity generated in this distributed fashion is amazingly high. Their best case scenario has installed MWs of rooftop solar PVs rising from about 2,000 in 2008 to almost 25,000 in 2015, more than a factor of ten increase over seven years.

The report uses conservative numbers for solar PV cost improvements – breakthoughs and innovations like the ones mentioned in Technology Review every week (like this one), will make the market penetration even faster (and higher) as they come to market.

I was pleased to see that our government has done this kind of research. Think what could be done if funding for renewable energy research and development was an order of magnitude higher!